Gyeonggi Province Supports Freelance Lecturers with Non-face-to-face 'Good Education'

[Suwon Ilbo=Park No-hun Reporter] Gyeonggi Province will convert existing face-to-face lifelong learning courses that have been delayed in operation since the outbreak of COVID-19 to a non-face-to-face (online) education system. Additionally, the province will promote a community "good education" initiative that involves freelance citizen lecturers and local small and medium-sized businesses in the production of learning content, thereby sharing both revenue and job opportunities.

According to Gyeonggi Province on the 25th, the existing Gyeonggi Province lifelong education programs primarily consisted of in-person group education where multiple people gathered in one place, in the format of multi-group forums, lectures, or group discussions. However, as the importance of physical distancing has grown due to COVID-19, the province has developed future-oriented non-face-to-face learning operations suitable for the changed educational environment on a project-by-project basis.

The online content production fields developed by Gyeonggi Province include ▲youth labor rights education ▲democratic citizenship education ▲sex education for children and youth ▲future education for youth (peace, creativity, character) and English education ▲reading parenting education, etc. Additionally, ▲Gyeonggi Province Living Skills School ▲lifelong education for the disabled ▲programs for out-of-school youth ▲visiting learning classrooms, etc. support non-face-to-face learning such as remote classes during business operations.

This education program utilizes approximately 1,700 provincial residents, including freelance lecturers who have faced difficulties in economic activities, to produce online lecture videos in various fields, and shares them with provincial learners through Gyeonggi Province's online lifelong learning service (GSEEK) or YouTube. It will also be operated through one-on-one online lectures between instructors and learners utilizing remote education systems such as Google Classroom and Zoom.

Freelance lecturers participating in learning content production will receive support including lecturer fees, manuscript fees, and excellent lecturer awards, while local small business owners supplying production technology, venues, and equipment for online lectures and remote classes will receive payments such as rental fees, production costs, and technical fees. This is expected to contribute to local economic revitalization at a scale of approximately 2.9 billion won.

Kim Neung-shik, Director of the Lifelong Education Bureau of Gyeonggi Province, said "The promotion of non-face-to-face education operations is an opportunity to establish a leading system for Gyeonggi Province's lifelong learning toward a future-oriented learning environment including online courses and remote classes" and "Through the participation of provincial citizen lecturers and local small business owners, this will be a meaningful beginning for Gyeonggi Province and the local community to overcome the COVID-19 economic crisis together and to prepare for the post-COVID era."